Gun regulation would do nothing to stop the STEM school shooting in Colorado

Updates to the identity of the accomplice, which were initially unclear. There are also further details into the charges and events which came to light after the initial hearing that was held in Douglas County at 1:30 pm on Wednesday, May 8, 2019

There are unconfirmed reports that a letter was sent from “Daniel Winsor, Director of Choice Programming” in the Douglas County School District detailing extreme concerns of abuse by the staff and faculty of the school, and the fear of an event like this taking place to the executive director of the school. That letter was allegedly sent on December 19, 2018. It appears to be legitimate, though it remains unconfirmed. I will be working to confirm this letter.

The Fact Zone

An 18-year-old male student and a juvenile female transitioning to male accomplice attacked a “STEM” school in Highlands Ranch, Colorado

The Story

On Tuesday afternoon, shortly before 2 pm, two gunmen entered a public charter school in Highlands Ranch, Colorado, and began shooting. They were apprehended two minutes after police were called, according to The Denver Post, but not before they had injured 8 students and killed another. The school itself is what is referred to as a “STEM” school, with a high focus on Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math. According to the school website, the school was founded in 2011 and only served grades 6 thru 9. Since that time, the school has grown to serve 1,800 students from kindergarten thru 12th grade, with 600 of those students attending the high school branch.

The suspects were scheduled to have a preliminary hearing in the Douglas County court system today. The main suspect is expected to be charged with 28 crimes, 25 of those are attempted murder. District attorney George Brauchler stated, “We’ve made no decisions about which charges to file.” Douglas County Sheriff Tony Spurlock has stated that two handguns were used in the attack and that he is working with the ATF to determine how those weapons were obtained, given that it is illegal for those under 21 to own a handgun in Colorado. Sheriff Spurlock also indicated that the newly passed “red flag” law would not have played a factor in preventing the shooting.

A person who has a child in common with the respondent (accused) regardless of whether such person has been married to or lived with the accused at any time.

A person who regularly resides, or regularly resided with, the accused within the last six months.

A domestic partner of the accused

A person who has a biological or legal parent-child relationship, including stepparents, stepchildren and grandparents and grandchildren

A person who is acting or has acted as a legal guardian of the accused

A person who was in an “intimate relationship” with the accused, as defined in CRS 18-6-800.3 Section (2).

A motive has not been identified as of yet.

My Take

The nation’s youth are in the midst of a spiritual and philosophical crisis. They are feeling lost, hopeless, unimportant, and angry. So much so, that there are those who believe that all life should be extinguished. We saw this with the single most infamous school “shooting” that the country has ever seen, and we continue to see it in all of the copy cat massacres. If one were to read the journals of the Columbine shooters, it would be extremely obvious that the source of violence and evil—at least in that case—is an extreme hatred of humanity.

No one is worthy of shit unless I say they are. I feel like God and
I wish I was, having everyone being OFFICIALLY lower than me.

…you may be saying “well what makes
you so different?” because I have something only me and V1 have, SELF AWARENESS. Call
it existentialism or whatever the fuck you want. We know what we are to this world and
what everyone else is.

-Eric Harris

It is an inability to cope with reality. When a person is faced with existential questions that apparently lead to nowhere—who am I, why am I here, what’s the point of it all—the natural result is nihilism. This is not a new phenomenon. It is something that we all probably face—a feeling that life is meaningless. Friedrich Nietzsche famously had a character state that “God is dead!… And we have killed him.” Nietzsche said this to emphasize that our scientific ability and increasing secularism eliminate our reliance on a higher moral purpose and meaning, which inevitably results in nihilism.

Leo Tolstoy also came to this conclusion, reasoning,

“My position was terrible. I knew that I could find nothing in the way of rational knowledge, except a denial of life; and in faith, I could find nothing, except the denial of reason. This was even more implausible than a denial of life. According to rational knowledge, it followed that life is evil, and people know it. They do not have to live, yet they have lived, and they do live just as I myself lived, even though I had known for a long time that life is meaningless and evil.”

-Taken from 12 rules for life by Jordan B. Peterson

Tolstoy figured that there were four ways to deal with life: childlike ignorance of the evil and meaninglessness of the world, ignore it and seek pleasure, continue to drag out life knowing that it is evil and meaningless and knowing that nothing can come of it, or destroy life once you come to the realization that it is evil and meaningless. Tolstoy himself allegedly chose the third option, hiding rope and weapons from himself, lest he became overwhelmed with reality and took his own life.

German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer stated that “The life of an individual, viewed as a whole and in general, and when only its most significant features are emphasized, is really a tragedy…” These men are considered intellectual heavyweights, and yet still came to the same conclusion that our teens are coming to. It is probably more likely to come to these conclusions when you are in the throws of the volatile emotions that accompany adolescence.

These events will continue to happen unless and until we address the root cause of the problem—a lack of higher purpose.

I am a political junkie. I have written several op-eds that were published in the Denver Post, the Pueblo Chieftain and The Denver Westword. Even so, my goal is to provide you with unbiased information for you to use as you wish, though I will also provide my unsolicited opinion if I feel strongly about a subject.
My biases are toward education and freedom. Everything that I write comes from those two perspectives. I look forward to our conversations!